As the cast and creative team of Bad Jews assembled for the first time to share their vision with Studio Theatre staff, board members, and supporters, director Serge Seiden opened his remarks with a personal anecdote about what it means to be a “good” Jew:
“Growing up in Maine I was the only Jewish kid for quite literally miles around – and we raised pigs on our farm! One summer when my kosher grandfather was visiting from the Bronx, the pigs got out and we were all chasing them around the fields. We told my grandfather we were just babysitting.”
Seiden went on to express that in a culture steeped in hundreds of years of tradition, both dogmatic and cultural, there are plenty of blurred lines about what it now means to be a good Jew or a bad Jew. Does contemporary Jewish identity and heritage hinge on family traditions or faith? How do politics and a traumatic history figure into the mix, particularly to Pesky Whipper-Snapper descendants who have their own unique perspective?
Artistic Director David Muse described the play as “a savage comedy that sits right on the fault lines in the American Jewish community,” adding that a recent report of regional theatres listed it as the third most produced play in America this season.
While the play engages debate about these complicated macro-cultural questions, Seiden and Muse were quick to point out that playwright Joshua Harmon frames the debate by pitting two super competitive, very intense cousins against each other in a raucous battle of barbs. Seiden added, “Daphna and Liam have the same comic foible. They are proud, puffed up, and over-confident—prime for a comic popping. One of the pleasures of the play is watching them head toward their inevitable explosive collision.”
After this discussion of theme and style, the designers each touched on how their design worked to set the stage in support of this high-wattage comedic battle. Scenic designer Luciana Stecconi created an intimate, recently renovated studio apartment on New York’s Upper West Side to serve as a pressure cooker for the evening’s proceedings. Once the limited square footage is filled with a pull-out sofa and two air mattresses, the characters have little choice but to bristle irritatingly close to each other as the tension mounts and pulses rise.
The costume design by Kelsey Hunt works within the contemporary realism to smartly express attributes of each character through their attire. Daphna’s pajamas with a utilitarian flair contrast Liam’s buttoned up, preppy, dork-chic graduate student look, described by Hunt as “Liam’s personal performance of WASPiness.”
Palmer Hefferan’s sound design is creatively based in a rock fusion created with traditional klezmer instruments. The juxtaposition of this ancient musical tradition of the Ashkenazi Jews of Eastern Europe played in concert with rock instruments immediately invites the audience into a world where the traditional is in conversation—as well as in tension—with the contemporary.
After the presentations, the larger group disbanded and the rehearsal process began in earnest with a first read-through of the script. Seiden encouraged the actors, “We’ll need a serious spirit of playfulness for this one. If we lose our sense of humor, we’re lost!” The actors took this to heart, and laughter erupted from the very first page.